Main menu

Wild and wide – concerning randomness and distributions

The course will begin with some exercises and demonstrations of the unexpected wildness of random phenomena including the effects of bias and non-independence (when one result effects others).

We will discuss different kinds of distribution and the reasons why the normal distribution (classic hat shape), on which so many statistical tests are based, is so common. In particular we will look at some of the ways in which the effects we see in HCI may not satisfy the assumptions behind the normal distribution.

Most will be aware of the use of non-parametric statistics for discrete data such as Likert scales, but there are other ways in which non-normal distributions arise. Positive feedback effects, which give rise to the beauty of a snowflake, also create effects such as the bi-modal distribution of student marks in certain kinds of university courses (don’t believe those who say marks should be normally distributed!). This can become more complex if feedback processes include some form of threshold or other non-linear effect (e.g. when the rate of a task just gets too much for a user).

All of these effects are found in the processes that give rise to social networks both online and offline and other forms of network phenomena, which are often far better described by a long-tailed ‘power law’.